Spring Term 2012 - Gillette, WY

Saturday, March 31, 2012 at Gillette College

Saturday U welcomes Jeff Lockwood, professor of Natural Sciences and Humanities; Mary P. Sheridan, professor in the Department of English; and Robert L. Kelly, professor in the Department of Anthropology and director of the Frison Institute. Their presentations will take place from 8:45am to 1:45pm at the Gillette College in Gillette.

Schedule

8:30-8:45 a.m.

Coffee and Donuts

8:45-9:00 a.m.  

Welcome and Opening Remarks

9:00-10:00 a.m.

Six-Legged Soldiers: Use of Insects for Torture, Terror and War
Jeff Lockwood, Professor, Natural Sciences and Humanities, University of Wyoming. Pushcart Prize and John Burroughs Award Winner. Author of Six-Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War (Oxford).

Insects have been used as weapons in weirdly creative, truly frightening and ultimately powerful ways. Find out how the emir of Bukhara used assassin bugs to eat away prisoners’ flesh. Explore the horrific programs of insect weaponization by the Japanese during World War II. What are today's defenses – and homeland security’s dangerous shortcomings – against entomological attacks?

Watch the video here:

10:15 -11:15 a.m.

Keeping up with the Joneses in a digital world
Mary P. Sheridan, Professor of English, University of Wyoming.  Author of Design literacies: Learning and innovation in the digital age (Routledge, 2010)

In today's digitally mediated, globalized world, social networking is not just a popular fad but is radically changing the way we live. This talk will describe the promise and perils of an increasingly digital world including current and emerging trends in the realm of education & health care.

Watch the video here:

11:30 -12:30 p.m.

Wyoming's Bighorn Basin: 14,000 Years of Climate and Human Population Change
Robert L. Kelly, Director, Frison Institute, and Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Wyoming

We can now accurately reconstruct changes in the size of human populations over thousands of years using a new method developed by UW faculty. Combined with new UW research into past climate change, we can also examine the relationships between human population size and climate change more precisely than ever before. Find out what these new insights from studying the past in Wyoming's Bighorn Basin could mean for the Rocky Mountain region's future.

Watch the video here:

12:45-1:45 p.m.

Lunch and Discussion 
Speaker Roundtable 
Join us for lunch and audience Q & A (no video available)